Soul Seeker
by Alamrin
Summary: "What is a soul?" He raised a pale, white hand to her chest, resting a cold finger in the tiny indentation just below her neck. "Show me your soul, Inoue Orihime... and give me mine..." A retake of episode 266 before Ichigo crashes in. R&R!


A re-take of episode 266 during the Hueco Mundo arc before Ichigo barges into the Fifth Tower to save Inoue.

I was watching the ep and thought, why not? Don't burn me too much if it sucks, I'm really not much of an Ulquihime fan anyways! My first oneshot. R&R!

**Soul Seeker**

"Are you scared?"

His deep, emotionless voice echoed her predetermined death in the silence of the tower. His emerald green eyes bore no light, no mercy, the sharp green descending down his bone-white cheeks in thin, straight lines like the soulless tearstains of an equally soulless being.

"Aizen-sama no longer needs you. There is no one left to protect you. You are finished. You will die here all alone, without anyone to hold on to….."

"I ask you if you are afraid…"

Large pools of shimmering grey pierced relentlessly into emerald. There was no backing down for the red-haired victim in question. _Kurosaki-kun …_

"I'm…. not scared."

Her small, melodic voice paled in comparison to his of dominant depth, but her words did not fail to cause a light lift of dark brows.

"Everyone came here to save me. My heart is already… with theirs…"

His eyes remained empty, but his brows now lowered. "How ridiculous," he muttered, "By sharing your feelings with your friends, you humans are able to set yourselves at ease. It's an instinct that prevents you from falling into a pit of fear and despair…"

His footsteps echoed as he walked towards her. He approached slowly, robotically, his eyes never leaving hers until he was but an arm's length away from her. "I have always thought it was impossible to truly share your feelings. It seemed to me a frivolous human delusion…"

"That may be true," her voice cut through the echoes of his. "But when you both care for each other…your hearts are able to draw a little closer together…That's what it means when we say our souls are one…"

He stared at her. His eyes which bore no light could not tear themselves away from those with light endless. He lowered his mutter to an almost-whisper, still deep, resounding and dominant.

"What is a soul?"

He raised a pale, white hand to her chest, resting a cold finger in the tiny indentation just below her neck.

"Could I see it if I tore open your chest?"

The hand shifted to the very middle of her forehead.

"Could I see it if I cracked open your head?"

It was the small, seemingly unnoticeable movements that this woman made which had always caught and held his curiosity.

The rush of air brushing past delicate lips as she gasped… the slight lifting of the breast at the inhalation… the widening of already large pools of grey as her determination gave way to the fear he knew she bottled inside…

His own emerald orbs bore down into her, piercing straight through what she deemed a soul… Her soul, that soul which dedicated all hope to Kurosaki Ichigo.

Kurosaki Ichigo.

Ulquiorra could feel the uncontrolled flare of reiatsu approaching the tower. It would be any second now…

The Arrancar placed an ice-cold hand upon a warm human cheek. Inoue blinked, once, twice… her lips parted in silent question.

#########

"INOUE!"

With a raucous and resounding crash, Ichigo ploughed through the flooring of the tower amid smoke and flying debris.

He stood unmoving, waiting for the smoke to clear and reveal Ulquiorra and Inoue.

The smoke cleared.

The tower was empty.

"What? Her reiatsu was just here! Inoue! INOUEEEE!"

#########

"Where… are we?"

Her soft voice bore slight confusion and telltale signs of fear.

He watched as she looked around the room. He had taken her to another tower, one quite far away from the previous. The room was just like any other she had seen before: barely furnished and cold grey. Still, her eyes slid over every piece of furniture as if looking for something different, something which would mark the reason why he had brought her here.

"Must I…" Ulquiorra breathed, his white eyelids shielding what he suspected were vulnerable eyes. "… Must I crack open your head, Inoue Orihime? Must your soul be forcibly bared to my gaze?"

She stared at the mysterious Arrancar standing before her, eyes closed, body rigid. It was the first time she had seen a change in the robotic exterior of this … this man.

He was a man. Apart from a puppet to Aizen's every whim… She felt within him the chained desires he locked away with a swallowed key. Her senses were still aquiver from the way her name rolled off his tongue, intoned with his deep, penetrating voice…

"N-no," she replied, shakily, feeling suddenly weak. She had been defiant all this time, and now, weakness had taken over. What worried her was that it was not fear…

Anxiety bubbled deep within her as he again walked towards her in slow but sure footsteps until he was but an inch away. No warmth resonated from him, but his uncertain reiatsu now did. Her Santen Kesshun had sensitized her awareness of these things, and she felt that he was unsure, confused even. She felt what his face never could show.

His hand reached tentatively to her chin and he tilted her head up to him. He wanted to see every flicker of light and every tightening and relaxing of muscle as he committed what could possibly be the worst crime as an Arrancar.

In the back of his mind, he was surprised the woman did not move, nor speak, nor try to push him away, not even when his icy black lips came into contact with her soft, warm ones.

He could not begin to comprehend the kind of feelings he felt inside his cold hollow body as he kissed her. The arousing flutter that was not meant to be called pain but too unique to be called pleasure smothered all form of rational thought as his thin arms slipped deftly around her waist, pulling her ever closer.

How he knew what to do was beyond him, but he felt himself deepening the kiss, probing gently and curiously, reveling in the glorious warmth of her lips and ample body. However, it was when he lightly dragged his fingers up her spine that she gasped, and his tongue dived into the hot, wet, devastatingly sweet cavern.

It was all a blur. All he could register was her warmth, the warmth of a human, the warmth of this thing called a soul; her arms sliding around his neck, her body pressing needily into his and her breath caressing his lips, cheeks and ears as whispered moans escaped her.

Then he felt his own body beginning to react: he started to become warm. It was an incredulous rush or heat that pooled at the pit of his stomach and flowed swiftly through his body, right up to his fingertips which slowly stripped her of that which labeled her as "one of them," as he was so apt to saying. He was ordered to say so. She was not human anymore…

Except that he didn't want that.

It was Inoue Orihime, the woman, the human, which attracted him deeply to her. His hands became firmer, angrier as he removed the Arrancar robes from her human body, and the Arrancar intrusion from her human soul.

"Show me your soul, Inoue Orihime…" he whispered in her ear as the heap of fabric fell to the floor. He touched his lips to her ear, earning a surprised but delighted moan. He high he developed from the sounds she made was enough to drive him over the edge. His movements were more desperate now.

He needed to drown himself in her. He pressed needy, open-mouthed kisses across her smooth shoulders and deliciously swelling chest as he pressed her towards the corner bed. By the time they got there, his clothing was already gone.

"U-Ulquiorra…"

That was it. She had spoken his name. She had said it in a voice strained with sexual desire, with want, but also with shock and perhaps even question.

He would have to answer her later, he could not stop now.

He devoured her as he lay above her on the bed, kissing every exposed inch of her body. He wanted to make her say it again. He wanted to make her gasp and sigh and moan and scream. He wanted everything to do with this human.

He wanted to find his own soul in her…

"Inoue…" he lowered his hips to hers and with one swift movement buried himself, his whole being into her warmth, and his eyes widened at the relentless pleasure he found there. Her own scream of relief told him that she was just as high as he was, and he looked down at her.

She bored into his eyes, her hands caressing the hair which fell over his ears and down to his neck. Her slim fingers sent tingles all over him as she brushed them over his pulse point.

She smiled.

There was light in his eyes. His green eyes shimmered and moistened as he began to move, causing her to squeeze her eyes shut in sheer loss of control.

Their bodies moved in sweet harmony as their sweat and moans mingled with one another into the sound of ecstasy. Now Ulquiorra was a warm body, a body with a developing soul, one which grew with every sharp spear of pleasure that spiked through him and her simultaneously.

He felt himself grow animalistic as he quickened his movements, eager to end his quest as a lonely soul seeker, needing to become one with the naïve human girl the very day he escorted her to Hueco Mundo, threatening to kill her while his mind and senses reeled from her resonating energy which shattered his robotic demeanor.

"Ulquiorra…!"

She shrieked his name as they both arched sweaty backs to accept waves of wonder which shuddered through their veins, connecting them as one being, one body and one soul.

He had found himself in her, and now he would never let go.

_Show me your soul, Inoue Orihime …And give me mine …_

#########

He lay upon wrinkled sheets and she on a newly fulfilled body, her head rising and falling with his breath as he relaxed and enjoyed his new found self.

"Aizen will kill you…" she whispered, tears prickling at her eyes as she pressed her lips to his chest, planting a soft kiss there.

"We will leave," he muttered, "We will survive … we will find a way…"

He tilted her head up to meet her eyes. "Arigatou, Inoue Orihime," he whispered, bending his head to meet her lips. He whispered against them, "I have seen your soul… and mine…"

Their lips met. Green flashes of reiatsu flared freely from his body and surrounded her with protective possession and the deep, passionate kiss marked the end of his search…

He had a soul of his own now …

############

Okay, so first oneshot, first Ulqui-hime, first re-take: First everything really. R&R!


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